After the Downfall

“So we are,” Drepteaza said. “We ought to get dressed, too, before someone comes over to find out why we’re not trying to ruin each other.”

“Wait,” Hasso said, and kissed her again. The kiss took on a life of its own, but not quite enough to start a second round. I’m getting old, dammit, the German thought. Even if he was still this side of forty, two in a row were only a memory.

She shook her head as she put on her breeches and tunic. “You are a very strange man, Hasso Pemsel.”

He shrugged. He couldn’t very well tell her she was wrong, not here, even if he would have been ordinary enough in the Reich. “I come from another world. What do you expect?”

As she had a habit of doing, she answered what he’d meant for a rhetorical question: “I expected you to act the way you look. I expected you to act like a Lenello. If I’d doubted you were one, I’d be sure you weren’t now.”

How did she mean that? Did she know how Lenello men made love? Did she know from experience? Do I want to find out? Hasso wondered, and decided he didn’t.

He pulled on his own trousers. “A good thing I see – uh, saw – those kicks coming,” he said. “Otherwise, we never do this now. If both those kicks get home, maybe we never do this forever.”

“I just have to practice more,” Drepteaza said sweetly. And how the hell did she mean that⁷. Once more, Hasso decided he didn’t want to find out.

Even if no one came out on the meadow and caught them in flagrante, the rest of the Bucovinans didn’t need long to figure out that Hasso and Drepteaza had become lovers. Rautat spoke for them: “You make her unhappy, you big blond prick, and I’ll cut you off at the knees so we’re the same size. Then I’ll really give you the whipping you deserve.”

“I don’t want to make her unhappy,” Hasso protested.

“You’d better not,” the underofficer growled. “She’s special, and not just ‘cause she’s a priestess, either.”

“You think I don’t think so, too?” Hasso said.

Rautat snorted. “Who knows what you think? Who knows if you think?”

“I love you, too,” Hasso said.

“Fat chance,” Rautat said with another snort. “Are we just about finished here? Can we go back to Falticeni pretty soon? We’ve done all the fooling around we need. We have to fight pretty soon – or don’t you think Bottero will come after us again as quick as he can?”

“Of course he will,” Hasso answered. “You know that as well as I do.”

“Well, no.” Rautat shook his head. “You’ve met the man. You know him. I haven’t. I don’t. Being on the same battlefield with him doesn’t count.”

Hasso hadn’t just met Bottero – he liked him. That had nothing to do with anything, not any more. Hasso thought Bottero’s enmity was only professional, not personal like Velona’s. When it came to wanting him dead, that might matter a pfennig’s worth. Or it might not. He stuck to business, saying, “We can go back to Falticeni. You’re right – we’ve done what we came here to do.”

“What about the dragon bones? Have you heard anything?” Rautat asked.

“Not a word,” Hasso said. “You?”

“Nothing,” the underofficer answered. “I wonder which of us they’d tell. I wonder if they’d tell either one of us.”

“They’d better. We need to know,” Hasso said. “And the people going after the dragon bones better get out before King Bottero’s army marches. If they come after, it’s too late.”

“Good point. They can make amulets for themselves and be safe from Lenello magic, not that that does us any good,” Rautat said.

“They can’t even do that,” Hasso said. “They don’t know what the dragon bones are for. They only know Lord Zgomot wants them.”

“You’re right. That’s your fault. We never would have worried about stuff like that by ourselves,” Rautat said.

“One more reason the Lenelli keep beating you,” Hasso said. “Their security isn’t very good. If yours is worse…” He rolled his eyes, but then he brightened. “The dragon bones should ward Zgomot’s men whether they know why or not, come to think of it.”

“Hmm. Yeah, I suppose so.” The Bucovinan paused, eyeing Hasso. “You know something? You’re starting to speak our language pretty well. Not like you grew up in Falticeni or anything, but pretty well. I think it’s better than your Lenello by now.”

“Maybe,” Hasso said. “If it is, I have to thank you and Drepteaza.”

Rautat leered at him. “Well, if you tried sweet-talking the priestess in Lenello, she’d make you sorry, and we both know it.”

Hasso thought about that. Drepteaza angry wouldn’t be an erupting volcano like Velona. She’d make him think a glacier had crushed him instead. Fire or ice? Better not to provoke either. The German said, “I know you think I’m stupid. I’m not that stupid. Hope not, anyhow.”

“I used to think you were stupid,” Rautat said. “Part of it was because you didn’t talk very well, not in any language I know. I’ve found out different since. Stupid you’re not, but you are bloody strange.”